Category Archives: Information

OpenAI Release o1, Its First Model With ‘Reasoning’ Abilities

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OpenAI is releasing a new model called o1, the first in a planned series of “reasoning” models that have that have been trained to answer more complex questions, faster than a human can. It’s being released alongside o1-mini, a smaller, cheaper version. And yes, if you’re steeped in AI rumors: this is, in fact, the extremely hyped Strawberry model, The Verge reported.

For OpenAI, o1 represents a step toward its broader goal of human-like artificial intelligence. More practically, it does a better job at writing code and solving multistep problems than previous models. But it’s also more expensive and slower to use than GPT-4o. OpenAI is calling this release of o1 a “preview” to emphasize how nascent it is.

ChatGPT Plus and Team users get access to both o1-preview and o1-mini starting today, while Enterprise and Edu users will get access early next week. OpenAI says it plans to bring o1-mini access to all the free users of ChatGPT but hasn’t set a release date yet.

Developer access to o1 is really expensive: In the API, o1-preview is $15 per 1 million input tokens, or chunks of test parsed by the model, and $60 per 1 million output tokens. For comparison, GPT-4o costs $5 per 1 million input tokens and $15 per 1 million output tokens. 

OpenAI posted the following:  

We’re releasing OpenAI o1-mini, a cost-efficient reasoning model. O1-mini excels at STEM, especially math and coding — nearly matching the performance of OpenAIo1 on evaluation benchmarks such as AIME and Codeforces. We expect o1-mini will be a faster, cost-effective model for applications that require reasoning without broad world knowledge.

Today, we are launching o1-mini to tier 5 API users at a cost that is 80% cheaper than OpenAI o1-preview. ChatGPT Plus, Team, Enterprise, and Edu users can use o1-mini as an alternative to o1-preview, with higher rate limits and lower latency.

Wired reported  OpenAI made the last big breakthrough in artificial intelligence by increasing the size of its models to dizzying proportions, when it introduced GPT-4 last year. The company today announced a new advance that signals a shift in approach — a model that can “reason” logically through many different problems and is significantly smarter than existing AI without a major scale-up.

The new model, dubbed OpenAI o1, can solve problems that stump existing AI models, including OpenAI’s most powerful existing model, GPT-4o. Rather than summon up an answer in one step, as a large language model normally does, it reasons through the problem, effectively thinking out loud as a person might, before arriving at the right result.

The new model was a code-named Strawberry within OpenAI, and is not a successor to GPT-4o but rather a compliment to it, the company says. 

In my opinion, OpenAI o1 could be useful for those who are teaching – or learning – how o1 works. Unfortunately, it appears that accessing it can come at a very high price point.

Death of the e-Reader?

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With summer nearly over, the family and I squeezed in a week in the heat of Catalunya, España otherwise known as Catalonia, Spain. It was lovely: 30 C and sunny every day compared with 15 C and lashing rain back home in Northern Ireland as the tail end of hurricane Ernesto passed over. And if that wasn’t enough, the pastries from the patisserie next door to the hotel were amazing.

As I lazed on my sun lounger in between laps of the pool, I took the opportunity to check out the tech of my fellow tourists. Lots of smart watches and activity trackers from the likes of Apple, Fitbit, Samsung and Garmin, but what was noticeable in their absence were e-readers – I didn’t see a single Kindle, Nook or Kobo. There was still plenty of reading going on, but people were using phones, tablets or traditional paperbacks.

Thinking about it, I’m not terribly surprised. A couple of things have contributed to the slow demise of e-readers (and I’d definitely distinguish that from e-books which are still going strong). First, the screens on smartphones and tablets have become so much better. Ten years ago, you would have struggled to read in strong sunlight but now the brightness of the displays copes well. Secondly, smartphone screens are bigger with a better resolution and colour. My Nook has a 6″ ePaper display versus my OnePlus 10’s 6.7″ AMOLED. It’s not just my observation either. Statista reports that in 2024 only 12% of people in the US own an e-reader, whereas in 2014 the figure was closer to 32%.

Unless you buy into the Amazon Kindle ecosystem, the booksellers haven’t done themselves any favours. My main reader is a Nook Simple Touch with Glow Light from 2012 and I’ve an original Nook (the one with the colour display along the bottom) that still works fine although the battery life’s a bit short. My biggest bugbears are that devices are becoming unsupported – you can’t buy digital content on device anymore and new PCs don’t recognise the e-readers when connected via USB. And don’t get me started on Adobe Digital Editions, which last saw major update in 2016 and has largely only received security fixes since then. It pains me (and my wallet) to buy a new device because of unnecessary obsolescence and corporate laziness.

The big benefit of an e-reader is not only the e-paper but also the lack of distractions. On my phone or tablet, there are always notifications coming in from other apps to divert your attention. Yes, there’s the “Do Not Disturb” setting but you do need to remember to turn it on. You need that peace to get into a book, though children yelling from the pool don’t always allow that either.

E-readers aren’t completely standing still. There are two innovations that have popped up recently: colour screens and Android OS. E-readers such as the Kobo Clara Colour offer a colour reading experience and Boox has e-readers with Google Play. They’re based on Android 11 or 12 but the opportunity to use any app (Kindle, Overdrive, Libby) for reading is powerful and brings much greater ease of use, hopefully without the distractions of a tablet. I suspect my next e-reader will be from Boox.

These innovations could see a resurgence in e-readers but with the cost of living going ever upwards, I feel that people will stick with what they have.

European Parliament Adopts “Right To Repair”

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The European Parliament posted: “Right to repair: Making repair easier and more appealing to consumers”.  The new rules reinforce the right to repair, aim to reduce waste and bolster the repair sector by making it easier and more cost-effective to repair goods.

On Tuesday, Parliament adopted the directive on the so-called “right to repair” for consumers with 584 votes in favour, 3 against and 14 abstentions. The rules clearly clarify the obligations for manufacturers to repair goods and encourage customers to extend a product’s lifecycle through repair.

Obligation to repair

The new rules ensure that manufacturers provide timely and cost-effective repair services and inform consumers about their rights to repair. Goods repaired under warrantee will benefit from an additional one-year extension of the legal guarantee, further incentivizing consumers to choose repair instead of replacement.

After the legal guarantee has expired, the manufacturer is still required to repair common household products, which are technically repairable under EU law, such as washing machines, vacuum cleaners, and even smartphones. The list of product categories can be extended over time. Consumers may also borrow a device whilst theirs is being repaired or, if it cannot be fixed, opt for a refurbished unit as an alternative.

Revitalizing the repair market

The rules aim to strengthen the EU repair market and reduce repair costs for consumers. Manufacturers will have to provide spare parts and tools at a reasonable price and will be prohibited from using contractual clauses, hardware or software techniques that obstruct repairs. In particular, they cannot impede the use of second-hand or 3D-printed spare parts by independent repairers, nor can they refuse to repair a product solely for economic reasons or because it was previously repaired by someone else.

The Verge reported the European Union has officially adopted a new set of right-to-repair rules designed to encourage people to repair broken devices, rather than replace them. One of the rules covers a product’s warranty by one year if it’s repaired while still covered.

The European Union already requires companies to offer a two-year minimum warranty on products, but these new rules take things a step further. Even after the warranty period ends, companies are “still required to prepare common household products.” Including smartphone, TVs, washing machines, vacuum cleaners, and other items. 

PCGamer reported that one manufacturer that will likely be at odds with the new legislation is Apple, which has employed something called parts pairing to prevent third-party replacements of certain components. 

Parts pairing means that even if a part on an iPhone is replaced with a like-for-like replacement by a third party, it may not be recognized by the phone unless officially sanctioned by Apple.

In my opinion, the right to repair is a good idea. It prevents broken products from being thrown in the trash, and gives those with the right skills a way to fix their own products.

Google Podcast is Dead

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What a sad ending to another Google endeavor that has happened so many times. Honestly, I am not surprised, as they have a track record of experimenting at the user’s expense. Killing off products that did not meet revenue expectations from a business perspective, I get it, but from a user experience, I hate it.

The loved Google Reader of the past was canceled when Google could not earn ad dollars from it as millions of people could consume content on it versus a platform they could monetize.

When Google Podcasts rolled out, I had high hopes after many years of working to help Android users find a decent Podcast app through my companies, SubscribeOnAndroid.com product, which gained a lot of traction with shows encouraging Android listeners to follow and subscribe.

We are now making sure that the product is again viable for Android users as Google has essentially created an extinction event for a percentage of Android Podcast listeners. Google has adopted a scorched earth policy and brainwashes people into thinking that YouTube is the end-all for Podcast consumption. Sure, some big shows are being discovered on their platform, but for the majority, it could be farther from the truth than anything to come out of their mouths.

Podcasters, by and large, hate the YouTube channel integration and the bevy of rules they must follow, which they do not have to follow in the traditional podcast space. The everyday challenges of being on that platform exist due to cancel culture and strict content monitoring.

Google will monetize against all your content, while the majority of podcasters will get nothing, no new audience, and indeed no money, as it’s nearly impossible to monetize through YouTube’s extensive hour-long listening rules to qualify to monetize podcasts unless you make the break and become and do a YT first strategy and put in the work to build a YT channel.

The fabled “podcast” menu item on YouTube only has a handful of successful so-called podcasts; everyone else is nowhere to be found. The average podcaster has little chance of breaking out, as we learned from Spotify. They don’t care about the podcast space. All they care about is monetizing on the back of creators.

Google Podcast, good riddance; we don’t need you anymore. Podcasters are taking back the podcasting space we created and expanding it through the Podcasting 2.0 initiative and great new apps at PodcastApps.com. We must rely on something other than gatekeepers to help the podcasting space grow and thrive. We have to do it on our own.

At the recent Podcast Movement Evolutions, YouTube presented to about 500 podcasters, and it was the most “I love me speech” I’ve heard in many years, and from the post-presentation reaction, they did not win many hearts and minds.

Meanwhile, Google Podcasts has abandoned millions of listeners and caused an extinction event, causing podcasters to lose 4% of their audience almost overnight.

We already are hearing podcasters scream bloody murder who have their heads down, as many do not follow the day-to-day news. On the one hand, it is a bad day for podcasting; on the other, we know whom we can trust to go forward.

Blubrry Podcasting AI: Level up Your Podcast with AI

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I’m thrilled to announce the launch of Blubrry Podcast AI Assistant (Blubrry PAI), a game-changing tool designed to streamline your podcasting process and enhance your content. Say hello to easier planning, production, and promotion, all powered by cutting-edge AI technology. I have been using the production tool here at Geek News Central for over a month, and the quality of the podcast and podcast episode posts is excellent.

What Makes Blubrry Podcast AI Stand Out?

  • AI-Driven Planning: Overcome creative blocks and align your content with audience preferences. Blubrry PAI provides insights from your episode goals, guest bios, and source material to help you craft compelling topics, questions, and scripts.
  • All-in-One Production: Simplify your workflow with an integrated dashboard that offers transcript creation, title suggestions, show summaries, episode art generation, and more—no need for extra services or special skills.
  • Automated Promotion: Amplify your reach with Blubrry PAI’s social clip creator and email campaign tools. Tailor your promotional efforts to each social platform’s unique vibe, ensuring your episodes get the attention they deserve.
  • AI-Media Clipping: (Coming Soon) Create promotional video clips tailored to each social media platform for maximum impact.

Get Started with Blubrry PAI:

Ready to elevate your podcasting experience? Blubrry Podcasting AI is available for all Blubrry hosting podcasters via a trial on the Podcaster Dashboard. Explore AI features and discover insider tips and tricks to maximize this powerful tool.

In a world saturated with podcasts, Blubrry Podcast AI Assistant gives you the edge to join the conversation and lead it. Whether you’re crafting your first episode or looking to scale your podcasting empire, Blubrry Podcast AI is your go-to for making every step of the journey seamless and impactful.

Bluesky Opens Up Federation, Letting Anyone Run Their Own Server

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Social network Bluesky, a competitor to X, Threads, Mastodon and others, is opening up its doors with today’s news that the network is now opening up federation, following its public launch earlier this month, TechCrunch reported.

The move will allow anyone to run their own server that connects to Bluesky’s network, so they can host their own data, their own account and make their own rules. This decentralized model of social networking is similar to the one that Mastodon already uses, but is underpinned on Bluesky by a different protocol, keeping the two networks separate, for now.

The growing interest in federation stems from consumer demand to have more control over their personal data — something that gained more attention after billionaire Elon Musk bought Twitter, rebranded it to X and changed its focus to become an “everything app” with a focus on payments, creators, video shows, AI … and lax moderation. That sent some former Twitter users in search of alternatives that were more sustainable, like Mastodon and Bluesky.

Bluesky posted the following:

Today, we’re excited to announce that the Bluesky network is federating and opening up in a way that allows you to host your own data. What does this mean?

Your data, such as your posts, likes, and follows, needs to be stored somewhere. With traditional social media, your data is stored by the social media company whose services you’ve signed up for. If you ever want to stop using that company’s services, you can do that — but you would have to leave that social network and lose your existing connections.

It doesn’t have to be this way! An alternative model is how the internet itself works. Anyone can put up a website on the internet. You can choose from one of many companies to host your site (or even host it yourself), and you can always change your mind about this later. If you move to another hosting provider, your visitors won’t even notice. No matter where your site’s data is managed and stored, your visitors can find your site simply by typing the name on the website or by clicking a link.

We think social media should work the same way. When you register on Bluesky, by default, we’ll suggest that Bluesky will store your data. But if you’d like to let another company store it, (or even store it yourself), and you can change your mind at any point, moving your data to another provider without losing any of your existing posts, likes, or follows. From your follower’s perspective, your profile is always available at your handle — no matter where your information is actually stored, or how many times its been moved…

The Verge reported that Bluesky is taking a big leap toward federating. On Thursday, the social network announced that it is opening up early access for users and developers who want to self-host their data. While this isn’t true federation yet, the company plans to open up federation to larger servers with even more users in its next phase. When the dust settles, anyone can (in theory) create their own server with their own rules on Bluesky’s AT Protocol.

In my opinion, this change could be interesting if it rolls out well. The next step would be for Bluesky to actually engage in federation with Mastodon.

Amazon’s Ring Will Stop Allowing Police To Request Doorbell Footage From Users

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Amazon’s Ring will no longer allow police to request users’ doorbell video footage in its neighborhood watch app, CNBC reported.

In a blog post on Wednesday, Ring said this week it plans to discontinue it’s “Request for Assistance” tool, which allowed law enforcement to submit requests for users footage in their communities through a publicly accessible post in its Neighbor’s app.

According to CNBC, Ring in 2021 made police requests for user footage public in its Neighbors app. Previously, law enforcement could message users privately to request clips from their smart doorbell cameras.

Police can still obtain Ring footage using a search warrant or a subpoena. In response to a 2022 letter from Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., questioning it’s police partnerships, the company disclosed that Ring may provide footage directly to law enforcement “in cases involving imminent danger of death or serious physical injury to any person.”

CNBC also reported that Ring has long sparked controversy about privacy due to its controversial partnerships with hundreds of police departments across the U.S. Privacy advocates have expressed concern that the program, and Ring’s accompanying Neighbors app, have heightened the risk of racial profiling and turned residents into informants, with few guardrails around how law enforcement can use the material.

Ring posted on its blog: “Ring Announces New Neighbors App Features, Sunsets Request for Assistance Post” Here is part of their post:

…We’ve all seen how Ring videos — whether heartwarming or silly — can bring us together to laugh, empathize or unite in a shared community. In 2023 alone, customers shared Ring moments with Neighbors, their social channels, and their friends more than a million times. Whether a bear relaxing in a pool, or a neighbor helping out with some shoveling, millions of people have found joy and hope in Ring posts.

Today, we’re announcing some changes to the Neighbors app based on what we’ve heard from our customers. We want to make it easier to continue to share moments that matter. That’s why we’re introducing Ring Moments, a new post category that expands the content allowed on the Neighbors app beyond just crime and safety…

…This week, we are also sunsetting the Request for Assistance (RFA) tool. Public safety agencies like fire and police departments can still use the Neighbors app to share helpful tips, updates, and community events. They will no longer be able to use the RFA tool to request and receive video in the app. Public safety agencies posts are still public, and will be available for users to view on the Neighbors app feed and on the agency profile.

The Guardian reported that civil liberties experts have long criticized Amazon’s close relationship with law enforcement and the company’s willingness to facilitate warrantless police investigations by allowing easy access to private security footage from people’s homes.

In response to the criticism, the company previously did away with the practice that allowed police to privately send requests for video footage to Ring users. Instead, police were only allowed to publicly post these requests on the app. Now, they can only obtain footage from Ring using a warrant.

In my opinion, this is a step in the right direction. More could be done, of course, like completely cutting off police from secretly gathering Ring footage from the devices.